What did Jesus mean when He said, "Love each other as I have loved you" (John 15:12)?

Having spoken of His commandments, now in verse 12 He shows that love is the very essence of His commandment, love that willingly relinquishes its own rights and comfort for the sake of the blessing of others. His love to us is its measure. None can be greater, for the next morning He would be on the cross, to lay down His life for those whom He calls friends. What a Friend indeed He was to them! Yet also, all who obey His commandments are His friends, that is, of course, those who give Him the supreme place of authority in true reality. In them only divine life is operative. Mere outward lip-service, as in Judas, was not enough.

He was leaving them. They were now to be bereft of the solace that His presence in their midst gave them. He would send the Holy Spirit to take care of them. But they were to see to it that they were to show that real interest in the welfare of one another that belonged to the Divine nature, of which they were partakers. They were to love one another as He had loved them. How had He loved them? He had laid down His life for them. This was the way in which this love became manifested. It was a self-sacrificing love. It was not a mere human affection, though it was now to be found in human beings. The love wherewith the Father loved the Son was the love wherewith the Son loved the disciples, and it was that same love that was to be active in them toward one another. He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for one another (1 John 3:16).

(Vv. 12, 13). Thirdly the new company is characterized by love. It is not only loved, but is a company that loves, for this is the Lord's command, "That ye love one another as I have loved you." This love is not to be after a human pattern, which oft-times is a selfish love; but a love that has no less standard than the Lord's love to us, a love in which there is nothing of self, for the Lord can say, "Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." Here death is viewed, not in its atoning character, but, as the supreme expression of love. Earthly love is often drawn out by something in its object that is lovable. Divine love rises above all our weaknesses and failures and loves in spite of so much that is unlovely. Such is the love of Christ, and such is the love that we should cherish toward one another. A love that is not indifferent to failures and blemishes, but, rising above all that is unlovely, serves its object even to making the greatest possible sacrifice — the laying down of life for a friend. As one has said. "No greater proof of love can be given; no higher standard set."

The Lord evidently introduces it as a new thing. "This is my commandment." It was His commandment specially. He it was that first gathered the disciples. They were a distinct company from Israel, though not yet baptized into one body; but they were gathered by Christ, and round Himself, severed from the rest of the Jews so far. "This is my commandment, that ye love one another." But according to what measure? "As I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." Shall I be told that any man ever loved, before Christ came into the world, as He loved? If a man will be ignorant, let him be ignorant, and show his unbelief by such an assertion, if he will. Now I say that there is a love looked for, such as could only be since Christ manifested it, and that His love fills and fashions after its own nature and direction. The disciples were now to love one another according to the pattern of Him who laid down His life for them as His friends. Indeed, He died for them when they were enemies; but this is out of sight here. They were His friends, if they did whatever He commanded them. (Ver. 14) He called them friends, not slaves; for the slave knows not what his master does; but He called them friends, for He made them His confidants in all He had heard of His Father. They had not chosen Him, but He them, and set them to go and bear fruit, abiding fruit, that He might give them whatsoever they asked the Father in His name. "These things I command you, that ye love one another." (Verses 15-17)

Now we have the command, "Love one another, as I have loved you," the only measure of our love to one another, is His to us. No wonder Paul said, "Owe no man anything, but to love one another." We have to be very watchful of our hearts regarding His commandment, lest we choose our own circle of friendships, and not that which divine love has chosen for us. The more we are resting in His love, the more our hearts will go out to all who are His. He has not loved us from qualities in us suited to Him; but He has produced in us by His grace the features of His Son, which He can find pleasure in. In his first Epistle John tells us, "We know that we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren;" and we are to lay down our lives for the brethren. The Epistle presents the truth absolutely, that we might have a true standard by which to judge ourselves. Alas, alas, how very far short we come of the standard. He does not ask us to do anything different from what He has shown us, for He laid down His fife for them, His friends. Nothing less than friendship will do for Him, though doubtless we should have been satisfied with the place of servants. The servant is not in the place of intimacy, but He has acquainted us with all the precious thoughts of the Father's heart; and He desires us to walk down here in communion with Him, so that He might communicate to us all relating to the Father's mind and will. And how he keeps His place as Man, although His divine glory shines out in this Gospel; for He does not speak of what lies in His own divine knowledge, but "what I have heard of my Father."

The new commandment is not a legal enactment; it can only be carried out as we are living His life and thus in communion with Himself. If the blessed Lord took up His Father's words as commands, well may we take the expression of His will for us, in the same way. The commands of the New Testament become an outlet for the renewed heart, under the influence of the love of Christ. Love that has to be "worked up" is artificial; the Lord is speaking of the spontaneous outflow of brotherly love; this is seen from the words "as I have loved you."

"This is my commandment that ye love one another, as I have loved you." If I look at the love of Christ for them, what I see in it is, that it was above all the wretchedness of the poor disciples - above all their failure. When I am not above a thing it acts upon myself, but when I am entirely above it I can think for it all, as well as with it. The Lord being above all the failure and wretchedness could, if a right feeling, feel with His disciples; if an infirmity, He could feel for them. He can enter into it all in a divine way, because of a divine mind; and with divine goodness, because He is above it all! His word to us is, "Love one another, as I have loved you." By clinging close to Christ, and learning from Him, we can love in the same kind of way in which He loved; and in this way we can recognise anything good, and of Him in our brethren, and learn to esteem others better than ourselves; that is what He expects - looks for in us. It is impossible unless we keep with Christ. What a path was His here! There never was such an isolated man as Christ, and yet there never was one who felt for others as He did.

374 "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends; ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you." He does not say He is the friend of sinners here; He speaks of their being His friends if they did what He commanded. Still our responsibility. He is treating them with perfect confidence. The true disciple He treats with the confidence of being His friend, otherwise He was betraying the confidence of His Father in telling His secrets. If I go to a person on a matter of business, I merely tell him my business, and have done with him; but if I go to a friend, I can tell him all that is on my own mind, even about what does not concern him at all, having full confidence in his love and his interest in what concerns me. "Henceforth I call you not servants but friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." Whatever I have had in my heart I have told you. What a place He sets us in! How we ought to hate ourselves for the constant way in which self hinders us from this blessed place of enjoyment. But what a comfort to the restored soul it is to find, that when we have learnt totally to distrust ourselves, Christ strengthens us and trusts us. He did so to Peter by those three questions - "Lovest thou me?" When Peter replies, You know, Lord, that I love you, He puts confidence in him, and says, "Feed my sheep; feed my lambs." But until all that is in us is perfectly humbled, He cannot put trust or confidence in us. How could He do it, when we cannot trust ourselves?

And shall we he neglectful or find excuse for not obeying when He commands us, not simply by the word of command, but by His own most infinite love that gave Himself, saying, "This is My commandment, that ye love one another as I have loved you." But, Lord, is not the demand too great? How can we love one another as Thou hast loved us? Yes, but that is His command He does not say as much as, but after the same character. How has He loved us? He has loved us by going beneath all that we were that He might lift us into His love. And you and I, beloved saints, are to think of the members of His Body, of those for whom He died, wherever they may be on this wide earth, as objects very dear to Him, and to love them not in word only but in deed and in truth. Let us confess our poverty in such love. He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

But the Lord loved them all. "As I have loved you." Their love to each other was to be of the same character, and to grow in intensity; though it can never reach the purity and strength of His love to them. Not even their love to Him is a measure large enough for the love which they are commanded to have for each other. Surely they all did love Him, but not perfectly. When James and John sought the highest places in the kingdom, they raised the indignation of the others, thereby proving that all had self as an object, not the Lord alone. It was their glory that occupied their minds. Peter loved the Master, came behind none in fervour, but fear made him deny his Master. The Lord's love to them was pure, patient, untiring, persevering; it never flagged. Nothing on their part could turn it aside. Nothing less than this is the pattern of their mutual love. The Lord does not say, Love me as I have loved you, it is, Love each other as I have loved you. Such power of love in them could only be the result of grace, of the power of the Spirit in their heart, she wing its reality in acts of human kindness, as well as in caring for each other's spiritual welfare. It is heavenly love in a human heart and manifested through a human medium! How greatly the Lord desired the mutual happiness of His disciples! What a divine preventive of strife and of the workings of a selfish nature! Had the church given heed to the loving Lord's injunction, disciples would have been one body in visible manifestation before men. In no mark of discipleship has the church failed more than in this. The varied and numerous names under which true believers range themselves afford sad proof. All the parties and divisions which now deface the church owe their origin for the most part, not to zeal for the truth, but to lack of love. Love does not seek occasion for separation, nor will it separate save upon scriptural ground; and when compelled by obedience to the word, always in sorrow and hoping for re-union. It is such a solemn thing, that the Lord has not left it to His disciples to decide when a man that is called a brother ought to be put away, or when au assembly is to be left. 1 Cor. 5 is plain for all immoral cases, and the Second Epistle of John decides with equal precision for the doctrinal. The touch-stone is the doctrine of Christ, the truth of His Person, His essential Deity and His manhood. Any one not bringing this doctrine was not to be received even into one's own house, much less at the Lord's table. The word being so explicit forbids us by implication to separate from any other cause. Upon any other ground separation is sin. False doctrine may arise in the church from which, according to the word, separation is imperative. But separation upon unscriptural ground is the place where evil doctrine finds a genial soil and a rapid growth. Divisions are not only the effect of false doctrine but the cause and occasion too. So we get a sorrowful sequence. Want of love works divisions, and divisions work departure from the truth, which in its turn opens the door to every kind of evil doctrine. Obedience to the word, "love one another," would have prevented the shame of such a scene; the Lord would not have been so dishonoured as we see.

"This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you" (John 15:12). It is not merely that I have loved you as the Father loved Me, but ye are to "love one another as I have loved you." The Father loved Christ as from heaven, and also in His humanity here on earth. Christ loved His disciples in a Divine sense from above, but, at the same time, as a companion on earth. Infinitely above them, morally speaking, but, at the same time, He puts Himself on a level with them in their trials and difficulties. "I am among you as one that serveth." He had to bear with all their infirmities; so have we. Our love is to rise above all the weakness of others and brothers without feeling their servant. I have to be in the infirmities of the saints, and yet so entirely above them that I can feel for others in them. I should be so out of it that I can understand them all, and yet feel for the person in them. It is a wonderfully perfect state to be able to do that — to be in the things, but yet so entirely above them in the spirit and power of my mind, so as to be out of them and above them, to feel for others in them. That is the character of love one to another. (We had better all get into that as fast as we can!) If you walk after Christ, after all it is abiding in Him enables us to do it.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13). This is entirely a different thing to laying down His life for sinners; here it is for His friends; it is the intenseness of His love; I sacrifice Myself for him. He does not say, I am your Friend, but we are His friends, He was the Friend of sinners, when He gave His life for them. We are His friends when we enjoy His confidence. He is showing how we walk in and keep the place of friends, He has treated them as friends. If I have a friend I tell him what is in my mind that is not concerning him at all. I impart all my thoughts to one who is my friend. The obedient one is the depositary of Jesus' thoughts. God told Abraham the things that concerned Sodom. And Abraham was called "The Friend of God" (James 2:23). The Lord always treated His disciples according to the place they were brought into; that is, as possessing it all. He speaks to His disciples as in possession of the things, though they had not realized them in the least. This was their own stupidity. Here the Lord comes to the source and certainty of grace in order that the practical responsibility under which He puts them should not cloud: for they were there. He had put them in the place of "friends," so He says, "If you want to walk in the place that is the way"; "ye are My friends, if ye do whatever I command you." He had chosen them for this.